In the application of closures to containers, it has become known to provide some indication that the closure has been removed in order to indicate to a user that the contents may have been tampered with. In one type of tamper indicating package, a plastic closure is applied to the container and a tamper indicating band is connected by weakened lines to the closure. The band engages a bead on the container such that when the closure is removed, the band is broken along the weakened line from the closure leaving the band on the container.
In one type of closure, the closure is made of plastic and the band is formed after the closure has been molded by a scoring along the periphery of the skirt of the closure. In such a closure, it is necessary to permit the closure to be stored for a long period such as 12 hours before the scoring is applied. This necessitates a delay in the production of the closures between the molding and the scoring operations.
In another type of closure, the band is connected to the skirt of the closure by a plurality of bridges. These bridges are molded in the closure necessitating a more complex mold. In addition the bridges must be such that they will not break upon application but will break upon removal. Accordingly, the prior art structures have disadvantages.
Among the objectives of the present invention are to provide a tamper indicating package wherein breakage of the bridge portions during application of the closure is eliminated; wherein positive means are provided for breaking the bridge portions on removal of the closure; wherein the criticality of sizing the bridge portions or weakened lines is eliminated; which simplifies the construction of the tooling for the closures; which reduces the amount of raw material in the closure and container; which permits the tamper indicating band to meet test requirements for the force required to sever the bond; which eliminates wing reversing operation and which allows the tolerances of scoring or formation of the bridge portions to be broadened and less critical.
In accordance with the invention, the tamper indicating package comprises a container having a neck with external threads formed thereon and a plastic closure comprising a top panel and an integral depending annular skirt. The skirt has integral internal threads thereon complementary to the threads on the neck of the container. The container having an annular bead positioned axially below the threads. The skirt has a ring at the lower end thereof connected to the remainder of the skirt along a weakened line below the threads when the closure is on the container. The bead has a notch in the periphery thereof. The band has a radially inwardly extending lug on the inside surface thereof such that when the closure is threaded on the container, the lug falls into the notch and engages the underside of the annular bead and when the closure is rotated to unthread the closure, the lug is cammed downwardly under the bead and at least a portion of the band is severed from the remainder of the closure.